OPD services not disrupted at most pvt hospitals

Sreemoyee Chatterjee & Niharika Alva | tnn
Bengaluru: The Indian Medical Association’s call to suspend routine services in private hospitals across the country on Tuesday, in protest against the National Medical Commission Bill, did not disrupt OPD services at most private healthcare institutions in the city. The strike call was withdrawn later in the afternoon.
Private hospitals such as Hosmat, Fortis, HCG, Manipal and St John’s functioned normally in the morning, though some doctors did keep away from work.Several OPD patients in these hospitals were seen awaiting their turn, as on any other day.
“It was left to individual doctors to go on strike if they wanted to. Our hospital is functioning normally. We’re not denying treatment or patient walk-ins at the OPD,” said Dr Sudarshan Ballal, chairman at Manipal Hospitals.
Dr Sanjeev Lewin, chief medical officer at St John’s Hospital, said: “Many patients travel long distances to reach our OPD. Shutting down OPDs will become a huge crisis for such patients, hence we are running full-fledged OPDs. However, we’ve given our doctors the liberty to keep off work in support of the protest.”
The OPD at Apollo Hospital and Belle Vue’s Cambridge Hospital looked deserted in the morning as they had partially shut OPD services. But all emergencies were treated and patients were informed to advance or postpone appointments scheduled on Tuesday. However, no patients were seen queuing up at the hospital counter. Apollo Hospital opened its OPD services at 4pm, after the strike was called off.
Dr BS Ajai Kumar, chairman at HCG cancer hospital, said: “It is not fair to refuse treatment to cancer patients at the OPD, and we are running our OPD services as usual. However, the proposed bill is a disaster as it could bring down quality healthcare. Engaging ayurvedic doctors for allopathy through only a bridge course is not acceptable, as it would collapse the whole system.”
“The government should have a dialogue with IMA and all other stakeholders, nominate a representative and form an autonomous body without ministers or bureaucrats to keep corruption in control,” he added.
Government hospitals like the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (Nimhans), Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology, Sri Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology, Victoria Hospital and Vani Vilas did not see a surge in the number of OPD patients till late noon, although they were prepared to handle additional patients in anticipation of disruption in services at private hospitals. All these hospitals received the normal number of OPD patients -- 700 to 1500 -- as on other days.
“There was no inconvenience for patients in the OPD,” said Dr CN Manjunath, director, Sri Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology.
“We are prepared to take care of any number of patients, but there hasn’t been much of a difference in the number of patients visiting the hospital today and on any average day. Everything is normal,” said a senior doctor from Victoria Hospital.
THE FLASHPOINTS
* National Medical Council Bill proposes to replace the Medical Council of India
* Bill proposes to allow Ayurveda, homeopathy, Unani practitioners to practise allopathy after completing a ‘bridge course’
* Bill proposes to allow Ayush doctors to get registered with bodies representing allopathic doctors
* NMC proposes an exit exam for MBBS graduates to issue them a licence to practise in India
* As per the draft bill, only five states in rotation will have representation in NMC, which means a state will take two decades to re-enter. Currently, all states have government representation in MCI, through state bodies like the Karnataka Medical Council
AIDSO protests, students burnt copy of NMC Bill
Opposing the proposed NMC Bill, the All India Democratic Students’ Organization (AIDSO) and Medical Service Centre (MSC), an organization of doctors, held a protest and burnt a copy of the NMC here on Tuesday.
Students from various medical colleges took part in the protest. “The NMC Bill proposes to bring about massive changes in medical education, including the exam system. It’s detrimental to medical students, doctors and the public,” said AIDSO all-India president V N Rajashekar.
“No opinion has been taken from educationists, students and doctors’ organizations in the making of the bill. The bill has also relaxed the essential criteria to establish medical colleges. It mandates no periodic renewal and if any college fails to meet the criteria, only a monetary penalty will be levied. This can lead to massive corruption and deterioration in medical education standards,” said Dr K S Gangadhar, Bengaluru district president, MSC.